Doing Great
by Blue Zombie
Summary: Johnny tries to commit suicide and Ponyboy visits in the hospital.


Things had all gone to shit so fast. I didn't quite know how it happened. Dal robbed some liquor store and got sent to the slammer, no questions asked. The weird thing was he had Two-bit with him and he got sent away, too. That wasn't Two-bit's style, a big robbery like that. He would shop lift, one thing here and one thing there, stealthily. He prided himself on it. Now he'd be spending who knew how many months locked up. Dally could take that, he was like one of those mystic guys who could just meditate and put up with any situation. It was Dally's greatest strength. But Two-bit couldn't do that. He'd go stir crazy.

But the worst thing was Johnny. Things had been real rough for him lately, his parents were drinking like they were gonna stop selling it and he'd been beaten to a pulp by his old man. It had been too much to take, I guess, cause he tried to kill himself for real. He slit both wrists, but his mother caught him just in time.

That was a miracle in and of itself. His parents were both pretty clueless and wrapped up in their own violent relationship and alcohol. They barely ever noticed Johnny unless they wanted to scream at him or beat the shit out of him. And his mother manages to find him before he kills himself?

I was going to see him at the hospital, but walking over there I felt kind of nervous. I mean, it was just Johnny, who I have known forever. And I know that he's a wreck, and I know he wanted to kill himself, he said it all the time. But now that he tried it, something is different. That's worse, and that's more crazy than just saying it. But being nervous doesn't matter and thinking he's crazy doesn't matter, just like Dal being a violent criminal doesn't matter, and Two-bit being a lazy bum doesn't matter. He's my friend no matter what he does.

It was one of those days with the pale blue sky just stretching over everything, and the light was kind of dim, like the day was a photograph that had already started to fade. I kicked at little rocks with my scuffed up white sneakers.

The hospital loomed ahead, that brick building with the signs over the doors, the automatic doors reflecting the sky and the street back at you. Johnny was in there, and I had to go see him despite wanting to just go home and not deal with this. I guess I could understand, in a way. But being suicidal was too extreme. Maybe it was because I wasn't that way. I wasn't happy all the time, but I couldn't see things getting so bad that killing myself seemed like an option. But then I wasn't Johnny. I tried to imagine it. His parents were serious alcoholics and fought all the time, and he got beat all the time. Was it just that? The fear of being hurt for reasons that were difficult to understand or just completely absent? Was it that he thought his parents didn't care about him? But we cared about him, the gang I mean. We cared, weren't we enough?

I asked where his room was and then I took an elevator up to it. I felt my stomach kind of lift drop as the elevator went up, like I was on a ride at the state fair or something.

I found his room down a hallway that was overwhelming me with the stench of alcohol and medicines and some kind of floor cleaner and vomit. I gagged. I hated hospitals and the way they smelled.

Johnny was lying in the white hospital bed, his eyes closed. Maybe he was sleeping. He looked awful. That beating from his old man was bad, he was all bruised. His lips were dry and cracked, and his top lip was split open, there was black dried blood on it. He wore one of those hospital gowns, and I could see the bruises on his arms, too, bruises in the shape of handprints.

That was bad, but the white bandages on both wrists were worse. The straps that tied his hands and feet down to the bed were worse. What did they think he was gonna do? Try and kill himself again? Leave?

"Johnny," I said, hoping in some way he wouldn't wake up. Maybe he was drugged and couldn't wake up. Then I wouldn't have to deal with this and talk to him, because he was scaring me.

"Hey, Johnny," I said, trying again. I was torn between going over to him and shaking him a little and just leaving, retracing my steps down the hall and getting in the elevator and leaving. But he opened his eyes.

His eyes weren't quite focused, it took him a while to gaze in my direction.

"Ponyboy?" he said, his voice a hoarse croak. He moved his wrists and seemed surprised that his movement was restricted by the straps that were tied to the bed rails. Then he seemed to remember and stopped moving.

"Yeah. Hey, how are you doing?" I said, pulling a chair over to his bed. What a stupid question. He was doing great, obviously.

"Okay," he said, but he turned away from me when he said it. I stared at the bandages on his wrists that covered stitches, and I wondered what he was thinking of when he cut into those arteries and veins.


End file.
